Technique May Prevent Rejection without Drugs.

Japanese researchers have developed a technique that may prevent the body from rejecting transplanted organs through the cultivation of the recipient's and the donor's white blood corpuscles with particular antibodies, reports  the Asahi Shimbun news site. Investigators have been refining the procedure since 2010 on 10 patients who had liver transplants at Hokkaido University Hospital. Four of them have gone without immunosuppressants for between two and six months. The other six have been able to reduce their intake of immunosuppressants from daily doses to once a week. The results will be presented at the American Transplant Congress's annual meeting in May.